The Pureblood Atheist

Last Sunday’s news that Richard Dawkins’ ancestors owned slaves came as shock to Christians everywhere. Although slavery was sanctioned in biblical times, Christianity’s recent revelation that slavery is wrong reveals Dawkins’ guilt in the matter. After all, God punishes future generations for the sins of their ancestors. The fact that this concept was used to defend slavery clearly isn’t relevant. The co-vice chairman of the European Pan-African Reparations Coalition is demanding for an apology from Dawkins for being born into such a family.

"The words of the apology need to be backed by action. The most appropriate course would be for the family to fund an educational initiative telling the history of slavery and how it impacts on communities today, in terms of racism and fractured relationships."

While this put Christians’ rosaries in a tangle, atheists had their own piece of startling news. Dawkins admitted on his blog to having an “unbroken line of six generations of Anglican clergymen” in his ancestry. The disappointing truth that Dawkins is a “mudblood” was only intensified by recent rumors that he is related to unicellular organisms.

Coincidence?

What are we to make of this? We need to find a pure atheist with solely reputable - and secular - ancestors to lead this movement. Such a paragon shouldn’t be hard to find. Although Dawkins hasn’t personally involved himself with slavery yet, he is tainted by the genes of those who did. However virtuous he may appear, he will always be part Anglican slaveholder. I also suspect there are murderers, thieves, fools, and bad-joke tellers hiding in his family tree. However, for those thinking a cruel and mysterious past gives the man more depth, don't be fooled, such a history with slavery is rather commonplace. He admitted, shamed at not having a unique back-story, "Almost certainly we are all descended from slave owners (and indeed from slaves), if you go back far enough, and you probably don’t have to go back very far". What will we discover next? Imagine the resulting scandal if we knew his great-great-great grandfather didn't believe in evolution.

However, there is a silver lining to this upsetting story. If we look far enough back, every theist has evolved from a common atheist ancestor. Perhaps liberal Christians can consider this "original sin". Still, it's hard to understand why a god would reveal himself to his creation a few thousand years before they would be capable of verifying his supposed miracles - but that point can be saved for another time. On a more serious note, figures throughout history have used family lineage to establish social hierarchies, and support racism - but today, through an understanding of evolution, we can find a basis for equality in common ancestry. A few years ago I read Darwin's Sacred Cause, which suggests the man was so passionate about his findings because he believed the idea of shared descent could end slavery.

Although it would have been nice for Dawkins to have the decency to be born through abiogenesis (leads to some interesting discussion) - and skip out on the sins of his forefathers - we have to face that he's only human, and Christian reporters have slow news days like the rest of us.